A "Faces of Evil" tie-in issue! Just when Green Arrow and Black Canary have gotten their lives back on track, the deadly assassin Merlyn comes back.
Other than that, the book is quite satisfactory. Basically, we get a story where Merlyn is hired to kill some tech-geeks. Green Arrow and Black Canary track him down and and a vicious struggle ensues. This is a competent, self-contained story with strong, well-rounded art that makes all the characters come alive as real people-- particularly the Black Canary who comes off as a good-looking, but tough woman and not some super-sexy comicbook vixen. Read Full Review
Check out the preview if you want a little sample of this issue. Read Full Review
Back to my original point, the Green Arrow is inherently lame. There are other characters, like Batman or Wolverine, who are much better suited for this sort of action romp. You simply cannot tell a good Green Arrow story unless there is an overriding humanistic theme to set the story apart. It's not enough to see Ollie out duel Merlyn. It's been done to death. Once you take away the existential drama of a middle-aged man being at a constant war with the incongruities between his ideals and his loyalties, what you are left with is an empty shell, dressed like Earl Flynn, who likes taping boxing gloves to the end of arrows. Read Full Review
After the whole Secret Invasion let down, I saw my fellow reviewers dismiss Bendis and all his Avenger titles. At the time, I though it was extremely petty to not at least give the series the benefit of doubt and try to stick with it. This months issue of Green Arrow/Black Canary was the 32-page foot in my mouth. Consider it dropped. Read Full Review
This is a very run-of-the-mill, cliche-laden issue from top to bottom. Black Canary has apparently taken a whole bunch of stupid pills, racing straight at an archer when she's been dating one since 1965 is the kind of move that only a real piece of Samsonite would attempt. Oliver fares a little better, but his tough-guy bravado with Merlyn irked me, and Merlyn's sudden admission (with NO real impetus, mind you) that Oliver is a better archer, after years of claiming otherwise, rings very false. The plot is a flimsy thing, designed to bring the archers face to face, and the kid who serves as the MacGuffin is so meaningless that he just DISAPPEARS during the battle, with no mention of whether he was caught, whether he ran, whatever. This, by the way, is a man who hired a killer and is indirectly responsible for the deaths of four people. The issue overall suffers from a lack of both consistency and clarity. The art, by Mike Norton, is serviceable, reminding me of a slightly l Read Full Review
© 2024
Prev
